
^ M 



THE SISTERS 



A "Play in One Jd 



BY 

HAROLD GODDARD 



THE SISTERS 



A "Play in One Jld 



BY 

HAROLD GODDARD 



COPYRIGHT. 1914 
By HAROLD C. GODDARD 

This play must not be produced without the consent of the author, 
who may be addressed at Swarthmore, Pennsylvania 



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PERSONS 

Mrs. Wetherell — worn out with a life of hard house 
work. 

Jane Wetherell — her daughter; ^^Miss Serious.'' 

Elsie Wetherell — her daughter; fluffy-haired, all 
smiles, giggles, and ribbons. 

Pauline Wetherell — her daughter ; vivacious, beauti- 
ful, earnest, intellectual. 

James Hancock — engaged to Jane; ambitious, strong- 
minded, brilliant. 

Charles Weston — engaged to Elsie; well-meaning, but 
weak. 

Lloyd Warwick — a society fop ; in love with Pauline. 



Edward Hancock — son of James and Jane in the sec- 
ond scene ; a boy of twelve. 

Mrs. Van Essen — who, in the third scene, has a summer 

home in the Wetherell Place. 
Professor Ambrose Pring. 
Guests. 



SCENE 
A room in the Wetherell home. 



TIME 

Scene I — A number of years ago. 

(Perhaps about 1883.) 

Scene II — Not so very long ago. 

(Perhaps about 1905.) 

Scene III— Now. (1914.) 



NOTE 

In staging this play the most important point to 
notice is the fact that the two long speeches in the last 
scene, one against and one in favor of suffrage, are 
not merely speeches. (If they were, the play would be 
hopelessly didactic.) They are frameworks rather, 
frameworks into which, point by point, the audience 
must fit the seemingly detached incidents of the previ- 
ous scenes, if it is to feel the unity and catch the signifi- 
cance of the play. The actor and actress who take the 
parts of Professor Pring and Pauline AVetherell, 
especially the latter, must bear this constantly in mind 
and assist, by proper pauses, emphasis, and in every 
other way possible, this work of '^recognition" on the 
part of the audience, recognition, to express it in 
another way, of the fact that life itself in the experi- 
ences of the Wetherell family has refuted Professor 
Pring 's speech and confirmed Pauline's answer to it, 
in advance. 

As much as possible should be made out of the cos- 
tumes, which should correspond as far as is feasible 
with the dates of the three scenes. 



The Sisters 

SCENE I. 
[7^ is evening. Mrs. Wetherell is crying softly, as 
she sits sewing at the table. Pauline comes i/n.] 

PAULINE 

Why, what is it, little mother! YouVe worked 
every minute since six o'clock this morning. You're 
all tired out. Don't try to sew. 

MRS. WETHERELL 

No ; it isn 't that. Pauline, what shall I ever do 
when you children are all gone, and I am left alone? 

PAULINE 

But we 're not gone . . . 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Yes, you are. John is married and gone. Jane and 
Elsie are both as good as engaged . . . 

PAULINE 

But you ought to be glad of that, mother. Think 
what fine fellows Charles and James are! — especially 
James. And besides, isn't it the natural thing for girls 
at their age to begin thinking of a home, and . . ? 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Oh, I suppose so. [Reminiscently.] Yes; I re- 
member well enough how I felt when I was first en- 
gaged. What hopes and dreams John and I had in 
those days : — that were never realized. It was in this 
very room (did yon know that, Pauline!) that we used 
to sit and talk about the future. And how unromantic 
I used to think mother was because she used to throw 
cold water on our visions. I understand, at last. Think 
what my life has been — especially since your father 
died! 



6 THE SISTERS 

PAULINE 

But think, mother, how much worse off you might 
be! You have us children; and (though it isn't much, I 
admit) you have enough to support you. 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Ah, Pauline, how little you appreciate ! All these 
years IVe been keeping a home, bringing up children. 
It's the one thing I can do ; the one thing IVe ever had 
an opportunity to do. And now, in a few years at the 
latest, that home will be broken up. What if I do have, 
as you say, ^^ enough to support me'M Which way am 
I to turn? Where am I to live I What am I to do? 

PAULINE 

But mother, your home isn't gone. YouVe still 
got me. Even if Elsie and Jane should go, we two can 
make a home. 

MRS. WETHERELL 

You! The best one of the lot! It's not long the 
men will leave you alone. There's that Warwick boy 
now that's hanging round . . . 

PAULINE 

Pooh ! Lloyd Warwick ! That society fop ! 

MRS. WETHERELL 

He's got lots of money. 

PAULINE 

He can keep his money. He '11 never get me to help 
him spend it. . . . It's not getting married that 
I 'm thinking of. / want an education. 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Just what I said! College! That'll take you away 
from me just as much as . . . [Breaking doivn.'] I 
wish that not one of you had ever been born. [Pauline 
is troubled.] 

[Charles, with Elsie behind him, looks in at the 
door.] 



THE SISTERS i 

CHARLES 

Oh, I beg pardon! [Mrs. Wetherell runs out.] 

PAULINE 

Come in, if yon want to, you silly spooners. The 
room is empty. [She goes out. Charles and Elsie enter, 
Elsie giggling.] 

ELSIE 

Let's tell them, Charlsie. [Gazing at a diamond 
ring on her finger.] Won't mother be shocked! [She 
goes into a spasm of giggles.] 

CHARLES 

But what's the use, Else^f We can't be married yet 
a while. I told you you would have to keep it hidden. 

ELSIE 

[Half petidantly.] What's the use of having it 
then? I want to show it. Why can't we be married, 
Charlsie! Give up your old law course and go in with 
your uncle. You know he's dying to have you. 

CHARLES 

But I don 't care anything about the wholesale grain 
business. And I am interested in the law. 

ELSIE 

But it'll take you perfect ages, Charlsie, to get 
started in the law. How can we ever stand it 1 

CHARLES 

Come now, Elsie, don't tempt me. I'm weak. 

ELSIE 

Let's set the date anyway — even if it's two years 
off. ... It won't cost us much to live. We'll live 
on love. [She giggles.] Oh I wish such a thing as 
money had never been invented ! 

CHARLES 

But hang it all, Elsie dear, you don't understand. 
It isn't just the money. I've got ambitions. After I 



8 THE SISTERS 

get a certain standing as a lawyer, I want to go into 
politics. 

ELSIE 

Oh I think politics are horrid. All they're good 
for is to make the newspapers uninteresting. 

CHARLES 

That's because you don't understand. Politics are 
mighty interesting; and what's more, in these days, a 
man can do a lot that amounts to something in politics, 
if he's straight. Maybe someday . . . [He pauses, 
embarrassed.] 

ELSIE 

You'll be President! And I'll be the President's 
wife! [Giggles.] Can you imagine me as lady of the 
White House! With my picture on the front page of 
the Sunday supplement! [She poses as for a picture. 
Then she goes into a paroxysm of giggling.] 

[James, followed by Jane, appears at the door.] 

JAMES 

Oh! I beg pardon! [To Jane.] It's the spooners! 

CHARLES 

[To Elsie.] It's ''the intellectuals." I suppose 
they want the lamp to read by. Come on; we're 
going . . . 

ELSIE 

We don't mind the dark, do we, Charlsie? [Gig- 
gles.] [They go out.] 

JANE 

What a silly pair! 

JAMES 

Shall I go on with the next chapter? [He has a 
manuscript.] 

JANE 

It's awfully interesting. But no. Let's talk a little 
first. James, how much money do you suppose you'd 
get from the novel! — if it were accepted, I mean, and 
were, well, moderately successful! 



THE SISTERS 9 

JAMES 

You're wondering, Jane, how soon can we be 
married? 

JANE 

No ; not that particularly. Oh James, I 'd wait all 
my life for you if it were necessary. 

JAMES 

It won't be. But I'm not counting too much on this. 
I expect to have to keep on with my newspaper work — 
it may be for several years. But it'll come at last. I'll 
stick at it till it does. 

JANE 

James, I love you most when that tone comes in 
your voice. And yet it makes me afraid . . . 

JAMES 

Afraid? of what? 

JANE 

That if you succeed — in your writing, I mean — 
it'll take you away from me; among people I'm not fit 
to associate with. I haven't any brains or any educa- 
tion. You'll be ashamed of me! 

JAMES 

Ashamed of you! You ought to be ashamed of 
yourself, Jane, even to suggest such an idea. And be- 
sides, we're going to read and study together, after 
we're married, every evening. I'll read you all my 
articles and stories, and we'll talk them over just as 
we do now. 

JANE 

[Her gaze far away.] I wonder . . . Why, 
here's mother's sewing! Those silly children must have 
driven her out of here. I '11 call her back. Poor mother ! 
We ought to tell her, James, that we're engaged. And 
yet how I dread to. 

JAMES 

She must realize . . . 



10 THE SISTEKS 

JANE 

[At the door.] Mother, come back. We're gone. 
[They go out.] 

[Presently Mrs. Wetherell comes back and takes 
up her sewing. Pauline j with a newspaper j comes in 
and reads near the lamp.] 

PAULINE 

My! how many interesting things there are in the 
paper. Isn't this strike out in Ohio dreadful! [No re- 
sponse from Mrs. Wetherell.] 

PAULINE 

Here's a man who predicts that in fifteen years 
Woman's Suffrage will be one of the leading issues of 
the day. 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Faugh ! The women better stick to their work and 
leave the men to theirs. 

PAULINE 

Just think, election's a month from tomorrow! 
Who do you suppose the new President will be? 

MRS. WETHERELL 

I don't know. Let me see : who are the candidates? 

PAULINE 

Mother ! Do you mean to say . . ? [Mrs. Weth- 
erell sobs.] I didn't mean . . . 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Never mind, dear. I know it's disgraceful. But 
when one has hardly had time to more than glance at 
a book or newspaper for twenty years and more . . . 

PAULINE 

Then that's the very thing for you to do. You must 
begin keeping up with the times. 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Oh Pauline, that's impossible. I'd have to catch 
up with the times before I could keep up with them. 
And I'm over twenty years behind. 



THE SISTERS 11 

PAULINE 

It isn't SO, mother. It isn't too late. Think of the 
time you'll have with so few household duties. You'll 
be living with one of us girls, and . . . 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Never will I come to live with one of you, if you're 
married ! Never ! Don't I know what that would mean? 
Didn't I have both of your grandmothers in my own 
house ! Never ! 

[The two couples come in.] 

ELSIE 

Mother! Look! [She shows her ring and giggles.] 

MRS. WETHERELL 

Why, Elsie! 

JANE 

And mother . . . I'm so sorry. [James stands 
back.] We are too! We, all of us I mean, just discov- 
ered out on the porch ... 

MRS. WETHERELL 

[Trying to control herself.] Yes . . . I . . . 
I . . . was expecting. I'm so glad . . . for 
you both . . . for you all. [She rushes out.] 

JANE 

Mother ! [She goes after her.] 

ELSIE 

I do think mother might be a little more cheerful 
about it. 

PAULINE 

You see ... it wasn't your fault . . . 
but we'd just been talking ... it was just the 
wrong time ... 

ELSIE 

I don 't care ! I think she might . . . 

JAMES 

I think I can understand . . . 



12 THE SISTERS 

CHARLES 

I must say it was a bit embarrassing for us. [To 
James.] Say, old man, did you hear what Jane said? — 
that she was dreadfully sorry but you were engaged 
too! [The hoys laugh. Elsie giggles.] 

ELSIE 

Come on! [They go out, leaving Pauline.] 
[Pauline stands perplexed. The door is pushed 
aside and Lloyd Warwick steals in.] 

LLOYD 

Pauline ! 

PAULINE 

Lloyd! You? 

LLOYD 

I found the front door open, so I . . . Come 
on, Pauline, IVe got the trap outside. It's a grand 
evening. 

PAULINE 

No. 

LLOYD 

What's the matter? . . . Say, I think you 
might be decent to a feller. 

PAULINE 

IVe got other, more important things, to think 
about. 

LLOYD 

What? 

PAULINE 

Things IVe got to understand. 

LLOYD 

What do you mean? 

PAULINE 

Everything. And especially what women are meant 
for in this world . . . IVe got to go to college. I 
can't go with you tonight — or any night. [She goes in.] 



on 



THE SISTERS 13 

LLOYD 

College! A girl like that throwing herself away 
books! Damn! [He goes. Pauline comes back.] 

PAULINE 

There's something wrong about all this. I want 

to understand these things. Fm going to understand 

them. 

[curtain] 



SCENE II. 

[The same room. Jane, now a middle aged woman, 
sits reckoning up hills — at the very table where her 
mother sat twenty and more years ago. Her son 
Edward, a boy of twelve, lies outstretched on the rug, 
reading.] 

JANE 

And two are thirteen, and one is fourteen. Think 
of it ! Fourteen dollars, just for milk for this household 
in one month ! 

EDWARD 

Mother, who was E-r-a-s-m-u-sf 

JANE 

I don't know. 

EDWARD 

He was some famous man. I can tell from what 
it says. Why don 't you know, mother I 

JANE 

I don't know anything, Edward — of that sort. 
You'll have to ask your daddy. 

EDWARD 

But daddy's never at home at night. Or, if he is, 
he's writing. 

JANE 

I know it. 



14 THE SISTERS 

EDWARD 

Mother, do you know who I'm reading about! 
[Jane is lost in thought and does not answer.] 

EDWARD 

Mother, do you know who I'm reading about? 

JANE 

No. 

EDWARD 

I'm reading about Sir Thomas More. [Silence.] 
Don't you think he was a splendid man? 

JANE 

[Absent-mindedly.] I guess so. Who did you say 
he is? 

EDWARD 

Is ? Oh, but he died a great many years ago. 

JANE 

Oh! 

EDWARD 

Do you know, when I grow up, I want to be just 
the kind of man that he was. 

JANE 

You won't forget your mother when you grow up, 
will you, Edward? 

EDWARD 

Why, of course not, mother. But don't you want 
me to be like Sir Thomas More? He was an awfully 
brave man, and when the King . . . 

JANE 

Was he a poor man, Edward ? 

EDWARD 

Oh no ! 

JANE 

No wonder he could be brave, then. [Half solilo- 
quizing.] I suppose I don't really mean it, but there 
are times when I feel like believing that you can't be 
very good in this world if you don't have a certain 



THE SISTERS 15 

amount of money. Whatever you do, Edward, when you 
grow up, I hope you'll earn enough so you won't have 
to spend every minute of your life scrimping and scrap- 
ing and wondering how in the world you're going to 
meet your next month's bills. Then, maybe, you'll have 
a little time left in which to be brave . . . Hark! 
Wasn't that the whistle? Do you realize, Edward, that 
your Aunt Elsie and your Uncle Charles will be here 
in five or ten minutes? It's the first Thanksgiving 
they've been back at the old home since you were a 
baby. Isn't it a pity there are no cousins to come with 
them? Think of all their money — and not a single 
child ! 

EDWARD 

Is Aunt Elsie as nice as Aunt Pauline? 

JANE 

Well . . . you can see what you think. 

EDWARD 

And Aunt Pauline can't come? 

JANE 

She wrote it was very doubtful. 
[James comes in, radiant, mtJi a letter and netvs- 
paper clippings,] 

JAMES 

Jane, read this ! 

JANE 

[Reading.] Why! 

JAMES 

And these reviews ! 

JANE 

Why, James, this . . . 

JAMES 

Yes, Jane, it's come at last — after all our strug- 
gling and waiting. Just think! No more financial 
worries! If the book keeps on selling this way — and 
it will — I'll dare resign from the Chronicle by the end 
of the winter and devote myself just to writing. Jane, 



16 THE SISTERS 

Jane, our dreams have come true — at last. Do you 
remember that night — how long ago it seems — here in 
this very room, the night we told your mother ? . . . 
I said, then, I'd stick to it ; and I have. But how many 
many more years it has taken than we dreamed. [Jane 
sohs.] 

JAMES 

Why, what is it, dear ? 

JANE 

Oh, I'm so glad for you! But for me it's come too 
late. Look at me! I've kept house all these years. I've 
brought up the children; and now they're all gone but 
Edward. And now that it's all over, what am I good 
for? I know how to be a drudge, and that's all. Think 
of the intellectual society that will be open to you. And 
look at me ! What do I know ? How am I fit to enter it I 
You'll be ashamed of me. 

JAMES 

Jane, Jane, it isn't so. [He is troubled, realizing 
the truth of what she says.] And besides, you'll have 
time to read now. 

JANE 

It's too late. I've forgotten how to read. . . . 
Listen! There they are this minute! Are my eyes all 
red? 

[James goes out and presently brings back Charles 
and Elsie. They are transformed: Charles is now the 
stout, brusque, successful business man; Elsie the pam- 
pered lady of leisure and fashion. She has a lap-dog.] 

ELSIE 

Jane ! 

JANE 

Elsie ! 

ELSIE 

And this big boy is Edward? Well, well, well. 



THE SISTERS 17 

CHARLES 

The old town looks about the same. But the house ! 
How much smaller it seems, Elsie ! 

JANE 

Come. right up to your room, first. [They go out.] 
[The child is left alone. Presently Pauline steals 

in. She still retains all her girlish vivacity and not a 

little of her freshness and good looks.] 

EDWARD 

Why, Aunt Pauline! You! 

PAULINE 

[Greeting him affectionately.] Hush! Listen! It's 
a surprise. I didn't expect to come. I was on the same 
train with Elsie and Uncle Charles ; but I didn 't know 
till I got off at the station. So I thought I'd steal in and 
never let them know. Where can you hide me? 

EDWARD 

Come up the back stairs to my room. 

PAULINE 

Good! What a lark! [They go out. Presently 
Elsie and Jane return.] 

ELSIE 

And dear me ! this is grand about the novel. I ex- 
pect you'll have so much money you'll be spending 
next winter with me in Florida. 

JANE 

Me at a swell hotel in Florida! No, no. It is just 
as I was telling James before you came in. It's come 
too late. 

ELSIE 

What's come too late? 

JANE 

The money. . . . Elsie, do you remember that 
night, years ago — it was here in this very room — the 
night we both told mother we were engaged ? 



18 THE SISTEKS 

ELSIE 

Yes ; I remember. But . . . 

JANE 

And how mother cried ? 

ELSIE 

Did she? I don ^t remember that. 

I 

JANE 

I went out to her in the kitchen. And we had a long 
talk together. And, do you know, tonight for the first 
time in my life, I have realized just how mother felt 
and what she meant. ^ ' I Ve given my whole life to mak- 
ing a home, ' ' she said, ^ ' and now I 'm good for nothing 
else.'' The same thing, Elsie, is true of me. I'm good 
for nothing else. 

ELSIE 

Come, come, Jane. 

JANE 

Here are the men. You'd better stay. I'll have to 
go to see about our supper. I hope I'll have a maid next 
time you visit us. 

ELSIE 

I'll come long enough to get a drink of water. 
[They go out. Charles and James enter.] 

CHAKLES 

[A copy of Jameses novel in his hand.] Oh! one of 
your muckraking novels, ehf Hero a young fellow with 
deep political vision . . . socialist, I suppose 
. . . exposes the villanies of the big business man 
. . . in love with his daughter ... all that 
tommyrot. I used to have some such silly notions my- 
self. Did, even after I studied law. But I tell you, 
James, if you went into business, you'd soon have all 
that moonshine knocked out of you . . . 

JAMES 

Are you really glad, Charles, deep down in your 
heart, that you gave up the law to go into business? 



THE SISTEES 19 

CHAKLES 

Huh? What makes you ask that? Of course I am. 
[In Charles's mind there is evidently some connection 
which leads to his next remark.] The longer I live the 
more conservative I grow in my political opinions. 

JAMES 

The longer I live the more radical I grow. 
[Jane speaks at the door as Elsie comes hack.] 

JANE 

James, can you help me a moment out here . . ? 
[James goes out.] 

CHAELES 

[Lighting a cigar.] Old place looks pretty bare. 

ELSIE 

It certainly does. I can hardly realize I ever lived 
in a place like this. 

CHAELES 

Hm. 

ELSIE 

But now that James has made this hit with his 
book . . . 

CHAELES 

The book does seem to be going. He's pretty set 
up over it. I don't blame him. 

ELSIE 

Yes; it's what he's longed to do all his life. 

CHAELES 

And his wife didn't make him give up his dreams. 

ELSIE 

What do you mean by that remark, Charles 
Weston? 

CHAELES 

You know well enough. Damn it. 

ELSIE 

Charles ! 



20 THE SISTERS 

CHARLES 

Perhaps you don't remember those nights . . . 
here in this very room . . . and . . . 

ELSIE 

What? 

CHARLES 

And what my ambitions were . . . Yes, God 
knows I had ambitions as well as . . . 

ELSIE 

And haven't you realized them? 

CHARLES 

Realized them ! You know what I wanted to do and 
be! And then, when we were married (two years too 
soon) and you had to have more money and that busi- 
ness opening with my uncle came again . . . oh! 
My soul was a pretty small affair I guess, to begin with. 
But you finished it all right, Elsie ! 

ELSIE 

Oh ! You brute ! 

CHARLES 

I suppose I ought not to say these things. But with 
that indictment still hanging over my head, and with 
the sight of James's triumph, and this room, and 
... Oh! oh! My God! 



in.] 



JANE 

[Calling, then entering.] Supper. [Edivard comes 

EDWARD 

Te, he, he ! [He giggles.] 

JANE 

What is it, Edward! [Pauline enters.] 

PAULINE 

Who — in this room — believes in votes for women? 
[There is consternation. In one breath they all cry 
Pauline'^ or ^^ Aunt Pauline' '; hut Pauline waves them 
back.] 



a 



THE SISTERS 21 

PAULINE 

I'll explain it all — at the table. But first; you 
haven't answered my question. Jane! do you believe in 
Votes for Women? 

JANE 

No ! Let a woman know her own place and not try 
to be a man. 

PAULINE 

Elsie! 

ELSIE 

I certainly don't. Do you think I want to go out 
and mix with a lot of ward heelers ! 

PAULINE 

Charles? 

CHARLES 

Fad! 

PAULINE 

James ? 

JAMES 

I do — most decidedly. 

PAULINE 

So do I. Take me in to supper. 

{She seizes his arm and they lead the company in.] 

[curtain] 



SCENE III. 

[The same room. Several years have passed. The 
Wetherell home, refitted, has become the summer resi- 
dence of Mrs. Van Essen, who, this evening, has been 
entertaining the local Woman's Suffrage League. Re- 
freshments have just been served in another room, and 
now Mrs. Van Essen, in conversation with Pauline 
Wetherell, is ushering her guests back into the library.] 

MRS. VAN ESSEN 

You mean to say, Miss Wetherell, that you used 
to live in this house as a child! I knew, of course, be- 



22 THE SISTEKS 

fore we took it that it was called the Wetherell 
Place . . . 

PAULINE 

Yes indeed; and after the family was broken up, 
my sister Jane lived here for years. When her husband 
gained literary distinction, they moved to New York 
. . . I should hardly know the house now. 

MRS. VAN ESSEN 

Yes ; we had it completely made over. 

PAULINE 

And yet after all this room is the same. 

MES. VAN ESSEN 

[To the guests.] If you will all find seats. Yes; 
you can hear perfectly out there. [When they are 
seated.] It has been suggested, now that the regular 
program of the evening and the refreshments are over, 
that we show our candor by listening for a few mo- 
ments to — the deviPs advocate: one of our guests, I 
mean, who does not, I understand, fully agree with 
the other speakers of the evening. Ladies and gentle- 
men, I have the honor and pleasure of introducing the 
distinguished opponent of Woman's Suffrage, Profes- 
sor Ambrose Pring, of the biological department of our 
own state university, who will tell us briefly why he 
does not believe in ^Hhe vote.'' Professor Pring. 

[Professor Pring is a portly man with a wide ex- 
panse of white shirt and waistcoat. He is all smiles and 
unction. His voice has a billowy roll and a peculiar habit 
of failing to fall at the ends of sentences. His careful 
enunciation, balanced gestures, lingering emphasis on 
important words, calculated pauses (during which he 
pats his rotund stomach gently), all give him the air of 
the wise man condescending furiously to his benighted 
audience. Yet he is not by any means a merely ridicu- 
lous figure.] 



THE SISTERS 23 

PROFESSOR PRING 

Madame Hostess, Members of the Woman's Suf- 
frage League, Friends: I suppose those of you who 
know me and are facetiously inclined will assert that 
the reason why I oppose suffrage for women is the fear 
that if the ladies are enfranchised I may become one 
of the victims of a bachelor tax. [Laughter.] On the 
contrary, when the evil day of the universal franchise 
arrives, I shall probably be driven to — marriage! 

But, joking aside, I suppose it does seem a little 
ungracious of me, after the earnest speeches of our 
friends who believe in votes for women and after the 
charming hospitality of our hostess, to say anything to 
mar the harmony of the occasion. And yet, my dear 
friends, the truth is the truth. It will not be altered, 
in its own august nature, by any of our petty opinions 
and desires; and I think I can show you that this so- 
called question which we are debating this evening is 
no question at all. It was settled many, many centuries 
ago, my dear friends, by one who is far wiser than any 
of us — Dame Nature. [He pauses for a particularly 
benevolent, unctuous, and protracted smile.] Let me 
see if I can explain this to you briefly. 

Nature, when she found man on her hands, saw 
that there were two fundamental problems which he 
must work out : one of these concerned his destiny as 
an individual; the other the destiny of the society of 
which he was a part. Man, if he was to live and 
progress, must do two things : he must, first of all, con- 
tinue his existence by bringing into being new, and if 
possible constantly better and better, individuals; and, 
secondly, he must perfect his being by the creation of 
a constantly better social order. Now Nature, perceiv- 
ing the essential difference of these two tasks, with 
wise economy, decided upon a division of labor, dele- 
gating to the female the creation and nurture of new 
individuals, and to the male (who, among many of the 



24 THE SISTERS 

animals that have little social life, had become almost 
superfluous except for his function as father of the 
race), to the male, I say, the constitution and ultimately 
the perfection of the tribal, or, as it became in its later 
stages, the social and political, life of the species. Isn't 
it perfectly plain, my dear friends ? The mother^ on the 
one hand ; the warrior^ or as he becomes in the civilized 
state, the voter ^ on the other hand. These are the poles 
of human life — widely and wisely sundered. You who 
propose to give the vote to woman propose nothing less 
than to reverse the order of nature, to ignore a funda- 
mental biological fact. Your proposal is doomed to 
failure in advance, as certainly as any proposal to 
ignore a natural law. ^ 

I have spoken briefly; but why, my dear friends, 
should I say morel Why waste time controverting a 
thousand incidental arguments for suffrage until you 
suffragists can answer this fundamental objection to 
your scheme! 

The place of the mother is in the home. Some of 
you seem to think that place an ignoble and restricted 
one. But consider! The mother's task is the lofty one, 
not merely of bringing new individuals into being but 
of preparing them for their future lives. What can sur- 
pass this in interest and importance ? And she also has 
a function as wife : the mission of making the home a 
place of rest and inspiration from which the man can 
go out, refreshed, to his work for the state. Her con- 
cern, I repeat, is with the individual ; his, with society. 
Although the individual cannot exist without society, 
it is even more profoundly true that society cannot 
exist without the individual. The woman's work is, 
then, my dear friends, in a real sense the more funda- 
mental and the more important of the two. Why should 
she not rest content with it? It is a full challenge to 
her best powers. Only when she is so bold as to assert 
that she is fulfilling it perfectly has she any right to 



THE SISTERS 25 

demand a share in man's task of perfecting the state. 
I thank you. 

PAULINE 

Madame Chairman: Could I be permitted a few 
words in reply to Professor Pring! 

MRS. VAN ESSEN 

I am sure there could be no objection. Miss Weth- 
erell may have the floor. 

PAULINE 

I ... I don't think there was ever a moment 
in my life when I so wished that I could be eloquent 
as I do at this present moment. Words are so inade- 
quate when one's mind and heart are full. . . . 
You see . . . though you are nearly all strangers 
to me . . . probably some of you know that this 
house, before Mrs. Van Essen came here, was called 
the Wetherell Place. My father was Jonathan Weth- 
erell. I'm Pauline Wetherell. . . . Many are the 
hours that I have played in this very room as a child, 
studied in it as a school girl, or helped my mother in 
it with the house work. And so, as I have been sitting 
here listening to Professor Pring, little bits of my child- 
hood and girlhood have kept swimming up out of my 
memory . . . and somehow ... it was so 
vivid . . . two evenings in particular, in this very 
room, seemed to come back to me out of the past. One 
of them was an evening — it must have been over thirty 
years ago — I remember it all — it was the night my two 
sisters told my mother that they were engaged to be 
married . . . the night I finally decided to have 
a college education. And the other . . . that was 
only a few years ago . . . the last Thanksgiving 
that we children ever spent together in the old home. 
But what am I telling ifou these things fori Oh, how 
inadequate words are ! If only by some miracle I could 
call up those very scenes, summon back those voices, so 
you could see and hear, then I think I could make plain 



26 THE SISTERS 

to you why, though I see, in theory, the truth of what 
he has said to us, I can't beheve, I never, never can 
believe, in what Professor Pring has said to us tonight. 

Let me see if I can, somehow, get it into words. 

In spite of views that some people, I suppose, 
would call radical, I'm a very old fashioned sort of 
woman. I believe in motherhood. . . . The hardest 
thing I have had to bear in life is the fact that my duty 
has seemed to me to lie along a path that has made 
it impossible for me to have a home and children of 
my own. If social conditions were right, it would be 
not only every woman's most sacred privilege, it would 
be (with rare exceptions perhaps) her most sacred 
duty, to have a home and children of her own. But 
social conditions are not right. And while they are be- 
ing righted, some of us, however great the cost, realize 
that it is for us to give up these things. 

Yes; I'm a very old fashioned sort of woman. And 
the reason I believe in Woman's Rights and in the vote 
is because I see in them not the destruction but the 
renewal and fortification of the old fashioned things 
that I love — of the home and motherhood. 

Professor Pring has said that Nature has provided 
for a division of labor on the part of the two sexes — 
woman being concerned with the individual, man with 
the state. To a degree that is true, and as far as we can 
see, always will be. But only to a degree. What part 
of a woman's life is given to the rearing of children! 
Anywhere from one-fifth up to — in rare cases in these 
days — one-half. And not all of that unless she is a slave 
to her home. I ask Professor Pring: What about the 
rest of a woman's life? Surely, surely, you have all 
known women who, devoting their lives to home mak- 
ing, have been left like derelicts — with twenty, thirty, 
or even forty years of life before them — when they had 
a home no more. Oh, if this old room could speak and 
testify what it has seen ! 



THE SISTERS 27 

And I have a second question. Granted that a 
mother's work should center in the birth and nurture 
of her children. Take such a mother. She has a son. 
That son, as we have heard, should devote his best 
energies to society. I ask Professor Pring this: How 
is a mother to bring up her son to live well in a world 
of which she knows nothing! More than that. How 
is she to bring up her daughter to respect and love 
only the type of man who does devote his best energies 
to society! Professor Pring has asked what can sur- 
pass in interest and importance the mother's task of 
preparing the child for its future life. Sure enough, 
what can ! But must not the mother, then, know some- 
thing about that future life! I wonder if these ques- 
tions mean anything vital to you. If you knew what 
they mean to me! — set as they are in the background 
of scenes that were once enacted, voices that were once 
heard, in this room? 

And I have a third question. How is a wife who 
knows and cares nothing about the affairs of state to 
be an incentive to, instead of a drag upon, her hus- 
band's public virtue? Haven't you ever known a young 
man of high civic aspirations — who married — and 
slowly but surely lost all those aspirations, because 
his wife had no power to understand or sympathize 
with them? Oh, I have! . . . What is such a 
woman's idea of the larger life outside her home? Of 
what it is at its worst I will not speak. At its best 
it is apt to center around some activity of club or 
church : the support of some lecture course, an interest 
in music or the drama, the chairmanship of some club 
committee ; or making cake for a church sociable, knit- 
ting a pair of mittens for the church fair, or helping 
to send a barrel to the heathen. Don't misunderstand 
me. I'm not sneering at these things. I only ask; what 
do such activities teach a woman of the state, or of 
society in any genuine meaning of that word? Next 



28 THE SISTERS 

to nothing. And so the wife who, today, is a spur to 
her husband in his civic life generally becomes so not 
because of but in spite of the conditions of her life. 

The upshot of the whole matter is that though the 
individual and the state may be separated in theory, 
they cannot be separated in practice. 

And so this is my creed. I believe in Woman's 
Suffrage, not because it is going to call the woman out 
of the home, but because, having called her out, it is 
going to send her back with a new and vital interest 
in her home ; because it is going to enable her, for the 
first time, to be three things that every woman ought 
to aspire to be — a free individual, a loving and efficient 
mother, an inspiring wife. Of course I don't mean that 
the vote is going to do all this alone. The vote, after 
all, is only a small part of the movement for woman's 
emancipation. But she needs the vote because it is not 
merely a social privilege ; it is a social duty. But I 've 
already talked too long. And I'm afraid, because back 
of my words, you cannot see what I see, I may not have 
made you understand. But I hope I have. 

MRS. VAN ESSEN 

I am sure that both Professor Pring and Miss 
Wetherell have given us much food for thought. This 
concludes the regular program of the evening. I hope 
that as we disperse, and after we go to our homes, we 
may continue the discussion informally. 

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